The document provides an evaluation of the film "Hoodz" created by Marcus Chippra and other students. It discusses how the film portrays stereotypes of teenage gangs based on research from other films. It also covers the filmmaking process, including researching costumes and locations, creating the musical score, and targeting the film towards an audience of urban teenagers aged 14-21. The evaluation reflects on the learning experience of creating the film and using various filmmaking technologies.

1. 2009
Hoodz
Evaluation
By Marcus Chippra

2. Evaluation of Media Film “Hoodz”
1) Our film follows four teenage boys, two whom are minding their business in a rival gang’s
territory and two youths who are from the other gang. We gathered our ideas and research from films
such as Kidulthood, Adulthood and The Warriors; we gave questionnaires to our target audience in
relation to this. During our research we studied they way in which the characters dress in Kidulthood
in comparison with the teenagers today, we found it was very similar. We based our costumes on
Adulthood, so we all wore tracksuits with our hoods on. In addition, we adjusted our personality and
behaviour; we were concealed most of the time trying to remain hidden from rival gang members as
well as the police. For the setting we decided we needed to have a quite dark and secluded area
almost like one in a horror but, still near a housing estate. We chose to film our sequence in the dark
to outline how rebellious the teenagers are i.e. being out late, causing mayhem etc. There are less
people out at night therefore, it makes it harder to be seen or caught. However, Adulthood we see
most crimes happening throughout the day so we deviated from this in attempt for a more realistic
feel. Violence and anti-social behaviour is common in towns and cities these days, it’s popularised
through music, films and video games. In our film, we portray this anti-social/intimidating behaviour
via our actions and emotions. In the production of Adulthood the music played a significant part upon
the release of the film, “Bashy’s – Kidulthood to Adulthood” helped promote the film using popular
grime/hip hop artists. In contrast, our opening sequence is very similar to a music video as we have
music playing through the majority of the sequence. We used a “Garage Band” a music programme on
the Mac books to create or musical score, it was difficult to compose a grime/London hip hop score so;
instead it’s more of a Drum ‘n’ Base score. We don’t see it many films but, it’s popular with teenagers
as it’s often heard from cars or parties.
2) The film's representation is stereotypical and specific social groups and other thing help
promote contribute to this representation.
From the outset of the film, we see Nick and Kris in a rival gang’s territory minding their business near
the skate park by our school in our tracksuits, hoods up and general 'thuggish nature'. So already in the
first few seconds of the footage we see a very stereotypical representation of youths or “hoodies”.
This stereotype has been formed from what the media i.e. TV, radio and newspapers have constructed
them to be like. This is definitely a very negative representation of the youths today.
Throughout the film, we have a chase between both gangs (Me, eventually meeting up with Ashley to
hunt down Kris, Jamie and Nick). The dialogue is quite significant as the colloquial language portrays
the authenticity of the film and also stereotypically at the same time we didn’t wish too over use the
slang and dialogue as at times it can seem humorous and we didn’t want that to happen. Rather than
have a long winded conversation, scenes with dialogue were brief and snappy in order to keep up the
pace and tempo of the film. Characters in the film are male, which enforces the common stereotype
off low class criminals being predominantly male. You will also notice that not all the actors and
'criminals' in the film are both white and Indian which I feel shows that this gang youth culture has
now spanned over to every single ethnic background.
The mise-en-scene was limited; we only had the costumes and use of mobile phones to communicate
with one another during the film. Also, we had Ashley’s car. However, the costumes made an impact
and gave the audience idea that these youths are up to no good looking anti-social and intimidating.

3. Also, the effect of the location shows that to secluded areas and quite, dirty housing estates.
We used a variety of shot's for the whole film, switching subtly from POV shots, low angle, high and
angle and pan shots, medium and long shots. For the brief conversations it was simply over the
shoulders shots, extreme /close-ups. We tried to mix it up as much as we possibly could to sync up
with the high adrenaline nature of the film itself, and I feel that we have done that successfully as later
on in the film the transitions form one shot to another become quicker.
3) The genre of our film is urbanised thriller based on young teenagers similar to which
Kidulthood and Adulthood. If our film did go into production it would most likely be on the exact same
path as Adulthood did due to our sequence being aimed such a minute audience. Our film being
distributed by the UK Film Council would be the most ideal one because they work with films which
are non-mainstream and support the idea of more UK Films going abroad. With the success of
Adulthood had through the UK Film Council they’re more likely to accept more films similar to its
genre like our sequence. During the distribution phase, P&A (Prints and Advertising) have to be
utilised that means organising press junkets, trailers etc. Maximising the P&A means that the
exhibitors can show the movie exclusively and make a profit. At the production phase TMC, DJ or
Cipher Films can be the production companies. Due to the rising popularity for films and culture like
Kidulthood they would be likely to produce our film.
4) Our target audience for our opening sequence were male/female teenagers and their age
ranging from 14-21, originating from urbanised areas and under the demographic class B, C1, C2, D
and E. As this is film on teenagers being reckless in society and it could be insight into some teenager’s
real life, so their psychographic profile is likely to be one of a struggler.
5) Upon attracting our audience it was down to the type of film, which was going to be like Kidulthood.
Being around about the same age as our target audience there would be no need to undergo dramatic
research in order to find out how teenagers behave, language speak etc. We are around other
teenagers all the time whom behave and talk differently. Aspiring to our target audience wouldn’t be
a problem as in way we are part of that target audience, it’s just putting the thoughts into context.
Same applies with our costumes, we didn’t have to go out and make or buy the costumes we already
had the costume as we our classified under the stereotypical teenagers ourselves.
During production we aimed to keep the camera shots relatively simple, we didn’t have the time,
experience or ability to do contemporary techniques such as the bullet time effect in The Matrix.
However, with our editing skills we were able to give that impression of complicated shots. We added
in slow motion to add emphasis to the head butt which is seen in films like Rocky and parodied in Scary
Movie so, its popular technique and that’s why we decided to use it. Dialogue, which was a debatable
topic amongst our group, we eventually decided to have some, from our preliminary; the dialogue was
very minimal and was hardly appealing to any audience. So from this experience we determined that
dialogue has to mean something as well as be appealing.
The post-production of Adulthood saw Bashy’s-Kidulthood to Adulthood really promote the film.
Unfortunately for us we do not have those kind of links however, we managed compose a musical
score which is quite appealing to our target audience.

4. 6) Throughout the whole project, from planning to the final evaluation, we have been required to use
many new media technologies to complete our film to a high standard. Such technologies include:
DV/HD Camera/(Tripod)
•
Apple Macbook Pro
•
Final Cut Express
•
GarageBand
•
Digital (stills) camera
•
Mobile phone
•
MP3 player
•
Internet
•
Live Type
•
I’ve had previous experience using a video camera whether it was just for family videos or recording
events such as weddings. So, within the first session of filming I was very easily able to adapt to the
camera settings and buttons. Nick and I were the cameramen, often discussing the shots; it was good
to have 2 people operate the camera as we both had different opinions on shots, positioning etc.
Executing pan shots with the tripod was only the slight difficulty we had; it did take a few takes due to
getting the smooth action of the pan correct.
As you know, instead of a normal laptop, we had to use a Macbook because it had all the suitable
programmes we needed to use to edit our footage. I and no-one in our group had no previous
experience with Macbook’s, so we found ourselves asking for our teachers help a lot when we were
just starting out. These programmes included Final cut express, which I didn’t have problem using due
to my previous experience when editing the preliminary task, Garage Band because the new syllabus
required us to create our own music and beats and integrate them into our film, as opposed to just
using a real Mp3 from another band. My experience using it was minimal as I used in year 9. Also Live
Type to do our credits Although this was tough, our whole group found it fun creating a tune that
would be suitable for our film, and luckily enough found the perfect up-beat song, or beat rather to
accompany the long running sequence.
On the first night of filming down by the underpass I decided to bring along my digital camera and take
some still photo’s of us setting up for filming, I have uploaded one of them to my blog just round the
corner from where we shot the graffiti scene. I already had previous experience with using a digital
camera so using it was no problem.
7) Looking back at our preliminary sequence we gained a lot of experience, getting use to different
type’s camera shots, positioning as well as using the editing software, Final Cut Express. We learnt a
lot from our preliminary, looking back on the edited version and comparing it to our main sequence
(Hoodz) there’s difference in how we use the camera correctly at the right time. For instance in our
preliminary we have the two boys standing up to shake hands, as they did this I zoomed in. I realised
after how much the camera actually shakes once it’s zoomed and viewed on the Mac book also how
amateurish it looks if not used correctly. Editing our preliminary sequence, due to it being the first
time we used Final Cut Express we experimented with the different types of effects and video
transitions. Comparing this with our main production, I learnt what different effects and transitions
can create different effects i.e. slow motion can create emphasis punch or head butt.

5. The pre-production phase was difficult due us living an unreasonable distance away from the site of
filming, we decided on Windsor as all of us know it well and our school is located there. Scripting our
film was also talked about within our group at one stage we were not going to have any dialogue after
our experience filming the preliminary where the actors were camera shy. However, we did come
over that because we changed the dialogue making it shorter therefore, easier to remember and say.